Postural Alignment and Somatic Integration

About this event

This class provides a meditative look inside, to activate deep support for your daily movement needs. We often think of posture as a fixed, usually ignored habit, however, by slowing down basic functional movements we take for granted, we get a backstage pass to this inner theatre of sensation and mobility that daily creates this illusion of effortlessness and stability. Rolling on to your side, changing your facing in the room, or coming to standing becomes a series of improvisational choices, rich with sensation and awareness. This process isn’t purely kinesthetic; it is supported by visualization and tactile stimulus, to coax out curiosity and play. We slow down in order to notice how fast our brilliant nervous system supports us. We explore movement choice at the boundary of what can be sensed consciously and your body’s ingenious store of unconscious reflexes, habits, and motivations. We work within a comfortable range of motion to notice the nuance between the blinding lights of stretch and strain. Effort becomes more specific and varied: How can I move without feeling my muscles forcing the movement? how can I use the weight of a limb here to my advantage? How can I vary the pathway of my foot through 3D space to make stepping easier? Or, possibly, how can I make it harder – more interesting? What can I do to keep my mind in my moving body? The movement in this class is based on the work of a lineage of somatic movement teachers that span a century. Rudolf Laban, Irmgard Bartenieff, and Bonnie Bainbridge- Cohen, respectively each add their own discoveries in their research about movement and consciousness. One throughline of these teachers’ focus is the interest in the evolution of human movement. This means their work brings our attention to the unique physics and sensory applications of having arrived in standing: as a species from the animal kingdom as well as an individual from the uncoordinated human infant.

From Myo Massage, Acupuncture, and Movement